After Ikkyu & Other Poems


Jim Harrison - 1996
    After Ikkyu is the first collection of Harrison's poems that are directly inspired by his many years of Zen practice.

The Last Time as We Are


Taylor Mali - 2009
    Kids love him and his poetry...and so do adults, a combination of approbation that is unusual in today's world.

John Prine Beyond Words


John Prine - 2017
    In this book, John Prine curates a selection of his best loved songs. Included are lyrics, guitar chords, commentary from John and over 100 photographs - may never before published - from his personal collection. John Prine has written songs that have become central to the American musical heritage. This former Maywood, Illinois mailman came to prominence with his debut record, 'John Prine' in 1971, which includes classics like, "Angel from Montgomery," "Sam Stone," "Paradise," and "Hello in There." His lyrics speak to the everyday experience of ordinary people, with a simple honesty and an extraordinary ability to connect with the heart.

The Best American Poetry 2002


Robert Creeley - 1990
    This year's exceptional volume, edited by Robert Creeley, a figure revered across teh wide spectrum of American poetry, features a diverse mix of established masters, rising stars and the leading lights of a younger generation. The pleasure of the poems selected here, Creeley explains in his introduction, is "that they caught my fancy, some almost outrageously, some by their quiet, nearly diffident manner, some by unexpected turns of thought or insight, others by a confident authority and intent." With comments from the poets elucidating their work, a thought-provoking introduction from Creeley, and Lehman's always popular foreword assessing the current state of poetry, The Best American Poetry 2002 will prove as irresistible to new readers as it is indispensable for poetry fans everywhere.

Words for Dr. Y: Uncollected Poems with Three Stories


Anne Sexton - 1978
    Most particularly if she writes poems about death and violence. Or at least that is the lesson that the posthumous careers of Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath seen to teach us.Reading this new volume of Sexton's previously uncollected poems, one has to wonder what will happen when there are no more half-finished poems left to be published. Will her grocery lists be next?I'm sure that the editor of this volume, Sexton's daughter Linda Gray Sexton, acts out of the desire to complete her mother's oeuvre, and apparently Anne Secton did leave instructions for at least some of her work, the section called "Letters for Dr. Y," to be published after her death. And in all fairness to Linda Gray Sexton I should mention that she and her co-editor Lois Ames did an excellent job of annotating and editing Anne Sexton's collected letters, putting together in A Self-Portroit in Letters (1977) a picture of a remarkably courageous woman and talented artist who fought her madness for many years.The heart of Anne Sexton's work lies in her earliest books - To Bedlam and Part Way Back, Live or Die, All My Pretty Ones. Here searing images take one by surprise, and the poems combine virtuoso technical skill with highly personal material is a way no one dies had ever done before. Yet as she grow older, worn down by her recurring bouts with insanity , Sexton's work grew sloppier, more self-indulgent , repetitive and heavy-handed. Her obsession with death and violence became more and more a part of some personal psychotic heil, more and more distorted each time she wrote, like a drawing one can't quite get right and finally ruins by constant erasure. The poems and the three horror stories in Words for Dr. Y are no exception.I would like to remember Anne Sexton for what I consider to be those extraordinary poems written in the face of great odds - poems like "Music Swims Back to Me," "You, Dr. Martin," "Her Kind." But the continuing publication of her inferior work tends to obscure her real achievement. [susan wood]

Healing the Divide: Poems of Kindness and Connection


James Crews - 2019
    Martin Luther King called the "beloved community," a place where we see each other as the neighbors we already are. Healing the Divide urges us, at this fraught political time, to move past the negativity that often fills the airwaves, and to embrace the ordinary moments of kindness and connection that fill our days.

Oak Creek: The Complete Small-Town Romance Series


Lainey Davis - 2020
    The four Crawford siblings might know all there is to know about their chosen careers, but they have no idea how relationships work. Growing up in a small town full of nosy neighbors, hilarious antics, and family that never butts out, you'd think they'd figure it out.Between the axe throwing, the apology chickens and competitive Scrabble, our heroes just might find true love. Eventually.This complete series features four full-length romantic comedies that will have you snorting with laughter as you follow Hunter, Diana, Archer and Fletcher Crawford up the creek with broken paddles.Can the Crawfords get their act together and figure out how to love? Dive into this steamy series (try to avoid the mating skunks) and escape with feel-good fiction.This set includes:The Nerd and the NeighborThe Botanist and the BillionaireThe Midwife and the MoneyThe Planner and the Player

The Max Freeman Mysteries Volume One: The Blue Edge of Midnight, A Visible Darkness, and Shadow Men


Jonathon King - 2017
    From a writer who “adds new dimensions of depth and substance to the modern crime novel,” this thrilling and critically acclaimed series follows a tormented ex-cop from Philadelphia to South Florida on a quest to earn redemption for his dark past (Michael Connelly).  The Blue Edge of Midnight: After a shootout during a convenience store holdup led to the accidental death of a twelve-year-old, Max Freeman left the Philadelphia police department behind for a life in exile in the Florida Everglades. Since then, he’s lived in seclusion, haunted by guilt, with the humid night and the nocturnal predators of the swamp as his only company. But everything changes when he discovers a young girl’s body floating in the muddy waters and becomes the prime suspect for her murder. To prove his innocence, Freeman must find the real killer—and confront his own tortured soul—before it’s too late.  A Visible Darkness: When five elderly women are murdered in Fort Lauderdale, Max Freeman is determined to get to the bottom of it. His friend, lawyer Billy Manchester, believes the crimes are tied to a conspiracy to collect on the women’s life insurance policies. But when Freeman uncovers a shocking betrayal, he soon realizes the gruesome plot reaches further than anyone thought possible. Now, it’s a race against the clock to hunt down the psychopath behind the murders—before the killer sets his sights on Freeman himself.  Shadow Men: In the 1920s, three of Mark Mayes’s ancestors left to help build the first road through the Everglades, backbreaking labor from which they never returned. Now, decades later, Mayes has discovered letters that point to murder as the cause of their disappearance, and he hires Max Freeman to investigate. But as Freeman follows the trail of evidence, he incurs the wrath of the corporation that built the road—and realizes the case may not be as cold as everyone assumed.

The Second Book of Robert E. Howard


Robert E. Howard - 1976
    Talman, September 1931"Sword Woman" "Which Will Scarcely Be Understood" (poem) "The Striking of the Gong" "The Song of Horsa's Galley" (poem) "The Good Knight" "A Word From the Outer Dark" (poem) "Black Canaan" "The Song of a Mad Minstrel" (poem) "Kelly the Conjure Man""Surrender" (poem) "The Footfalls Within" "Knife-River Prodigal" "Musings" (poem) "Life" (2, "They bruised my soul . . .") (poem) "The House of Suspicion""Rueben's Brethren" (poem) "Two Against Tyre""The Guise of Youth" (poem) "For the Love of Barbara Allen""Guns of Khartum" "Lines Written in the Realization That I Must Die" (poem)

Season of Saturdays: A History of College Football in 14 Games


Michael Weinreb - 2014
    Half of them finish the day in joyous celebration, and the other half in abject depression, but all of them are ever ready to do it over again the next weekend.College football is one of the unifying cornerstones of American culture. Since the first game in 1869, football has grown from a stratified offshoot of rugby to a ubiquitous part of our national identity. Today, as college conferences fracture and grow, amateur athlete status is called into question, and a playoff system threatens to replace big-money bowl games, we’re in the midst of the most dramatic transitional period in the history of the sport.Michael Weinreb’s Season of Saturdays examines the evolution of college football, from the moral and ethical quandaries that informed its past to the fascinating changes that may affect its future. Since its nascent days on elite Ivy League campuses, college football has inspired both school spirit and controversy. Weinreb explores the game’s inherent violence, its early seeds of big-business greed, and its impact on institutions of higher learning. Filtered through the stories of such iconic coaches as Woody Hayes and Joe Paterno and Steve Spurrier, Season of Saturdays also celebrates some of the greatest games of all time while exploring their larger significance. Part popular history, part memoir—and always uniquely American—Season of Saturdays is both a look back at how the sport became so fraught with problems, and a look ahead at how the sport might survive another century.

10 Timeless Heroes


P.L. ParkerDonna Michaels - 2014
    From sweet to sizzling romances, 10 Timeless Heroes has a little something for everyone.P.L. Parker - FionaTime shifts in ever changing motion. But can love survive the ravages of time? Set against the backdrop of Ancient China, Fiona finds herself transported to a time of barbarian warriors and marauding nomads from the northern steppes. She discovers a new way of life in the arms of the handsome warrior Kellach, a man of noble stature among the Celtic settlements ringing the great Taklamakan. Desperate to return to the present while struggling against her mounting feelings, she finally accepts her fate, exulting in the rapture and delights to be found as Kellach’s mate. High Priestess Voadicia wants Lord Kellach for her own - and only the outsider Fiona stands in her way. Beth Trissel - Somewhere My Lass (Somewhere In Time #2) Will Mora and Neil be too late to save a love that began centuries before? '‘The MacDonald comes’ warns Mora Campbell when Neil MacKenzie finds the young Scotswoman lying unconscious at the top of his stairs after he discovers his murdered housekeeper slumped at the bottom. Mora’s claim that she’s his fiancé from 1602 and was chased to the future by clan chieftain, Red MacDonald, through ‘the door to nowhere’ seems utter nonsense. Neil thinks she’s addled from the blow to her head until his life spirals into chaos and the avenging Highlander shows up wanting blood. Mora knows the Neil of the future is truly her beloved Niall who disappeared from the past, but he must also remember. And fast. Although Niall’s kinsmen believe he’s dead, and Mora is now destined to marry his brother, she’s convinced that if she and Neil return to the past, all will be right. The balance of the present and future are in peril if she marries another, and the Neil of the present will cease to exist. The only problem is how to get back to 1602. An ancient relic, the ultimate geek friend, and a little Celtic magic help pave the way back to the enormous challenge that awaits them. If they’re in time. L.L. Muir - Going Back for Romeo (Muir Witch Project #1) Alone, with a Highlander, in his castle, on a cold dark night... (Okay, so it wasn't that cold.) Jillian MacKay is being conned by a pair of eighty-year-old lunatics. They’re convinced she’s the perfect sucker to test a prophecy and they’re willing to bury her alive to prove it. Once she escapes and finds herself in 15th Century Scotland, she believes her return home depends on a heroic deed - she must rescue a plaid-clad Romeo and Juliet before their romance can end in tragedy. The monster standing in her way, however, is a handsome Highlander who might just be her own Romeo... a Romeo she must leave behind. Rather than surrender his secrets, Montgomery Ross would prefer to go down in history as the heartless creature who betrayed one sister and buried the other alive. When he falls in love with the prophesied faery who has come to expose him, he'll have to learn a wee lesson from the star-crossed lovers or suffer the fate to which he once condemned them. Skhye Moncrief - Swordsong (Time Guardians #2) The most valiant time guardian saves his soul mate from an unorthodox time traveler wanting to steal her heart to gain control of the timeline. Murdo McEwen's stuck in present-day Scotland with a bent time-travel key and only swordsmith, Katie Innis, can repair it. Duty requires he return to his time. His ticket home relies on a lonely woman haunted by more than the apparitions visiting her. Her track record with men keeps her distant. And ghostly events keep pushing them closer together. Earning her trust will require the kind of patience only a valiant time guardian learns during his twenty years of apprenticeship. If time-travel duty, romance, and a bit of magic don't help them realize their destiny resonates in mysterious fairy SWORDSONG, all known history could change. Sky Purington - Highland Mystic (The MacLomain Series - Early Years #3)Alan Stewart loves the lasses. Beautiful all, he's never been one to settle. Until, that is, Caitriona appears. Shy yet alluring, her unexpected and rare gift gains his respect. Though his need to protect her grows, a dark ending looms. Only Alan knows that her death soon comes and he will not be able to save her. Caitriona Devereux is not who she seems. Her fate was foreseen long before birth and so important it will impact all future MacLomains. When dreams of Alan Stewart begin, she knows the time has come. But how to convince a Highland laird from another century that he must die for her? Especially when it soon becomes apparent that she couldn't bear his death. When their paths cross with Stephen and Arianna of the Broun clan, a powerful prophecy begins to unravel. Though promised to Iain MacLomain, Arianna Broun is in love with Stephen. They'll do anything to be together. Alan and Caitriona will afford them just such an opportunity. Betrayal and loss will intertwine with passion, friendship and new beginnings as the four race toward their destinies. All will discover how far they are willing to go for love. But will the journey be worth the ultimate sacrifice? Nancy Lee Badger - My Honorable Highlander (Highland Games Through Time #1)Bumbling present day herbalist, Haven MacKay, gets more than she bargains for when her love spell goes awry, is cast back in time, and meets her true love - Laird Kirkwall Gunn. Kirk’s plans go slightly off course when he falls in love with a woman wandering through the Scottish Highlands. After all, he has pledged to marry another, from an enemy clan, in order to end a century-old feud. Caroline Clemmons - Out Of The BlueDeirdre Dougherty never cursed at anyone, much less put a curse on the potato crop of her remote Irish village. She'd rather take her chances with the Atlantic lapping at the bottom of the cliff than the mob intent on burning her as they have her cottage. Deirdre leaps... and plops down over 160 years later in a Texas lake. She doesn't understand how she’s ended up with the man from her recent visions or why he has the same name as the saint to whom she prayed. She’s in danger of falling for the handsome policeman who rescued her, in spite of the fact that he thinks she’s lying to him. How can she convince him her story is true when she’s finding it difficult to believe the tale herself? Police Detective Brendan Hunter wants answers. Who shot him and killed his partner? Why? And why does Deirdre know details of the event? Her story has to be a colossal fabrication or else she’s a beautiful psycho. Either way, he wants her gone before he becomes even more fascinated with her. But he can't let her out of his sight until she confesses to how she learned details no one but he and his late partner knew. Bess McBride - A Train Through Time (Train Through Time #1)College teacher Ellie Standish thinks she's on a sleek modern train heading to a conference on women's studies in Seattle, but she awakens from a night's doze to find herself on a bizarre historical train full of late Victorian era reenactors who refuse to come out of character. When the leader of the group - one handsome, green-eyed Robert Chamberlain - finally convinces her the date is indeed 1901, a skeptical Ellie decries any eccentric theories of time travel and presumes she is smack dab in the middle of a very interesting historical dream. She turns the directorial reins of her dream over to one smitten and willing Robert, only to realize that dreams cannot last forever. Someday, she must wake up to reality, though Ellie no longer has any idea what reality is. She only knows that Robert must play an important part in her future. But how can he... if he's only a figment of her imagination or worse yet... a man who belongs to an era long past? Donna Michaels - Captive Hero (Time-Shift Heroes #1) Marine Corps pilot, Captain Samantha Sheppard changes history when a test flight takes her back in time, inadvertently saving the life of a WWII VMF Black Sheep pilot. To preserve the timeline, she abducts the flying Ace back to the present and hides him at her secluded cabin in the Colorado wilderness. Convincing her sexy, stubborn captive he’s now in another century proves harder than she anticipated - and soon it becomes difficult to tell who is captor and who is captive when the more he learns about the future, the more Sam discovers about the past, and their soul-deep connection. But as their flames of desire burn into overdrive, her flying Ace makes a historical discovery that threatens her family’s very existence, and Sam’s fears are taken to new heights when she realizes the only way to fix the timeline is to sacrifice her captive hero... or is it? Can love truly survive the test of time? Linda LaRoque - Desires Of The HeartLoren Fairchild longs for children, but is barren. At a cottage in Carlisle, UK, she puts her divorce behind her and begins a new life. In 1947 the former owner’s wife disappeared. That same week, according to local gossip, her husband took up with a dark-headed harlot. One morning in 2007, a simple-minded woman appears at Loren’s cottage and triggers events that change Loren’s life forever. Miles Chapeau misses the wife, the mother of his two children, he’d known before the war. When he returned from WWII in 1945, he learned she’d been hurt in an air raid and has the mind of a child. He loves her and would never forsake his duty, but misses the intimate side of marriage and a woman to share his life. One day she disappears and his existence is turned upside down

How to Enjoy Poetry (Little Ways to Live a Big Life)


Frank Skinner - 2020
    I referred them to Doctor Who's Tardis.'Frank Skinner wants you to read more poetry. Wait, wait - don't stop reading. Whether you're a frequent poetry reader or haven't read any since sixth form, Frank's infectious passion for language, rhythm and metre will win you over and provide you with the basic tools you need to tackle any poem.In this short, easy-to-digest and delightful book, Frank guides us through the twists and turns of 'Pad, pad' by Stevie Smith, a short, seemingly simple poem that contains multitudes of meaning and a deceptive depth of emotion. Revel in the mastery of Stevie Smith's choice of words, consider the eternal mystery of the speaker of the poem and be moved by rhyming couplets like you never have before.Give it a go. You never know, you might even enjoy it.

Milwaukee Noir


Tim Hennessy - 2019
    Each book comprises all new stories, each one set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the respective city.Brand-new stories by: Jane Hamilton, Reed Farrel Coleman, Valerie Laken, Matthew J. Prigge, Shauna Singh Baldwin, Vida Cross, Larry Watson, Frank Wheeler Jr., Derrick Harriell, Christi Clancy, James E. Causey, Mary Thorson, Nick Petrie, and Jennifer Morales.From the introduction by Tim Hennessy:Presently, Milwaukee is going through a renaissance—abandoned factories being converted to condos, craft breweries and distilleries pushing out corner taverns—yet at the same time it is among the most segregated and impoverished big cities in the country. The gentrification of neighborhoods outside of downtown bear the impact of twentieth-century redlining efforts, forcing residents out due to housing demand, adding fuel to the affordable-housing crisis. Such an environment and atmosphere make excellent fodder for noir fiction . . .The book you’re holding is the first of its kind—a short fiction collection about Milwaukee, by writers who’ve experienced life here. The crime/noir genre at its best can be one of the purest forms of social commentary. I’ve gathered contributors who can tell not just a fine story, but who can write about the struggles and resilience of the people who live here . . . I’m honored to compile a body of work that represents what I love, and fear, about Milwaukee. I love my city’s lack of pretension; its stubbornness and pride in the unpolished corners. I fear that my city faces an uncertain future—that as it becomes more divided it may push our best and brightest to find somewhere else to shine.

A Week With Enya: We live blind...


Amar B. Singh - 2019
    Where we don't, we read, we ask, we learn and then, we solve! What happens when there are no answers though? When nobody in the world knows! When we see the need to invent Gods even if we can't discover Him. Through a string of poems, the author narrates such an experience with his non-verbal and autistic daughter, Enya. What started as a week of babysitting for him soon became a seeking to change her into 'normal'. But, that seeking ended up transforming the seeker!The narrative in the form of poetry touches upon the revelation that comes out of desperation of not finding an answer at all and therefore, the thoughts getting tired of themselves and the mind taking a back seat. In that silence, the author says, things become clear and all aspects of life show their inter-relation! The intellect gives way to the intelligence, the body and mind as 'me' gives way to the world as 'me'! The mind map once seen, one starts to see the true nature of the 'me' and that perspective and clarity make everything clear and possible in life...

Poems that will Save Your Life: Inspirational verse by the world's greatest writers to motivate, strengthen and bring comfort in difficult times


John Boyes - 2010
    In this superb anthology can be found the best of the English-speaking world’s inspirational and reassuring verse, including such classics as Rudyard Kipling’s ‘If’ and W.H. Davies’ ‘Leisure’. This beautifully illustrated collection of over 120 poems is sure to offer solace, hearten the soul and motivate the human spirit.